Educating millennials and Generation Z

One of my students recently asked me: "What is a canceled check? How can I use one in a fraud examination?"

Many college students have never written checks and use digital apps to pay for goods and services. These questions reflect the impact that younger generations will have on fraud examinations and investigations.

Higher education must keep pace with changes in the world, and anti-fraud educators are no exceptions. While much has been written about changing delivery of courses and new ways of learning for millennials and Generation Z, actually altering traditional methods has been a slow process.

Characteristics of millennials and Generation Z

While there's no precise definition of the time span for generations, millennials are considered by many to be those born between 1980 and 2000. Generation Z, which follows the millennials, will be making their entrance into colleges and universities in the near future. A 2012 report from The Council of Economic Advisers highlighted facts about millennials:

• Millennials are now the largest, most diverse generation in the U.S.
• Technology has shaped millennials.
• Millennials value community, family and creativity in their work.
• More millennials have college degrees and are more likely to attend graduate school than any generation before them.
• College-going millennials are more likely to study social science and applied fields.
• As college enrollments grow, more students rely on loans to pay for post-secondary education.

According to Deloitte's 2016 Millennial Survey, millennials:

• Express little loyalty to current employers.
• Feel underutilized and believe they're not being developed as leaders.
• Are more independent and more likely to put personal values ahead of organizational goals.
• Are redefining professional success and proactively managing their careers.
• Prefer, in the majority, to work from home or other locations where they could be most productive.

A 2010 Pew Report, Millennials: A Portrait of Generation Next, described millennials as "confident, connected and open to change." The greatest identifier of millennials surveyed was the use of technology.

Generation Z — those born between the mid-1990s and early-2000s — picks up where the millennial generation ends. The Institute for Corporate Productivity describes personality traits that define Generation Z:

• Pragmatic.
• Competitive.
• Connected (prefer face-to-face communication at work).
• Socially responsible.
• Customizers (creative, idea-generators).
• Plugged-in.
• Self-reliant (prefer to learn at their own pace).

Both millennials and Generation Z want regular, extensive feedback and look to employers for mentorship to assist them in their careers.

So how can we use this information to improve students' experiences in our courses and provide employers with new hires who meet their needs?

Educational strategies

Educating these younger generations can be complicated. We must keep in mind both the generational characteristics and the changing face of business. While the elements of the Fraud Triangle will continue to be present, what they look like will evolve.

Higher education has been wrestling with how to best serve students. We're slowly replacing the lecture style with more interactive, hands-on approaches that embrace technology as a tool to facilitate the exchange of information.

Here are some techniques that we might apply in fraud examination classes:

1. Flipping the classroom. This technique shifts more responsibility from instructors to students who participate in active learning and group activities during classes. Instructors can use such activities as hands-on case problems, conducting interviews and identifying the elements of the Fraud Triangle using real world stories. To save class time, students watch videos on their own time prepared by instructors or other experts. Then students can spend more in-class time on application and interaction.
2. Gamification. Who doesn't like playing a game? From a simple Jeopardy-style competition to choose-your-own-adventure exercises, instructors can use their creativity to design meaningful learning activities in gaming formats. Kahoot (getkahoot.com) — a free, easy game-based learning platform — adds a competitive component to test comprehension of material.
3. Polling. Students use free and easy software apps such as Poll Anywhere and Socrative on their mobile devices to text their answers to quizzes during class to instructors who instantly monitor their comprehension.
4. Role-playing. Instructors use role-playing to practice interviewing skills and expert-witness testimony. See ACFE.com for numerous practice cases. A good place to start is with the ACFE fraud casebooks, including Bribery and Corruption Casebook: The View from Under the Table, Computer Fraud Casebook: The Bytes that Bite and Internet Fraud Casebook: The World Wide Web of Deceit.
5. Choices. Allow students to choose from a series of non-traditional, alternative activities that support course content. Students can direct their learning and focus on those activities that appeal to their curiosity and creativity. Examples include: recording an interview with a fraud examination practitioner, creating an original fraud museum using the ACFE Fraud Museum as an example or critiquing a movie from a fraud examiner's perspective.
6. Blogging. Class blogs help students practice writing skills by discussing topics like social responsibility and ethics in public forums. Blog components often are built into online learning management systems such as Blackboard, Desire to Learn and Canvas Platforms such as WordPress or Blogger are free and easy to use.
7. Virtual speakers. Why not bring an expert to class virtually? Use Skype, FaceTime and Google Hangouts for online interviews and platforms such as WebEx, Zoom and GoToMeeting for remote group meetings and presentations. These tools are naturals because millennials and Generation Z often prefer remote working environments.
8. Mentors. Millennials in particular feel they aren't being developed as leaders. Providing mentors to students will help their understanding of workplace expectations and the career paths they've chosen.
9. Service-learning opportunities. Businesses or nonprofit organizations can provide projects for students that help connect them to the community. For example, have students complete a practice fraud risk assessment for a company on-site. Or ask students to review IT security controls for potential vulnerability and provide recommendations for improvements. These are practical activities that can also add value to students' areas of expertise while they pursue degrees.
10. Create timelines of big frauds. Enron, WorldCom and HealthSouth are now in fraud history books. Students who research major fraud cases and create timelines learn from the past while taking advantage of digital tools from the present.

Feedback and rewards

Millennials and members of Generation Z love regular, frequent feedback. Clear expectations help foster communication and assessment. While rubrics are fairly common in K-12 education, many college instructors have never used them or aren't even familiar with them. A rubric is a scoring tool that describes the criteria for grading and details the expectations for meeting various levels of mastery. Designing your first rubric might be time-consuming at the front end, but it will save time when you're grading the assignment. Rubrics can help provide the structured feedback your students seek.

Some millennials and members of Generation Z are known as "trophy kids." They grew up in environments in which every team member received a trophy for participation whether or not they excelled. Rewarding accomplishments through the use of electronic badges might appeal to these students. Along with the rubric, students can receive badges that correspond to their level of performance: novice, intermediate or master, for example. You can use Mozilla's online platform, Open Badges, to create and track this type of reward system.

Continuing education

Certified Fraud Examiners are required to complete a minimum of 20 hours of continuing professional education (CPE) credits each year. Other professional licenses and certifications also require mandatory continuing education.

Millennials and Generation Z want short, focused opportunities to earn CPE credits. Regulating groups are heeding their requests. The National Association of State Boards of Accountancy and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants recently approved granting of CPE credit for Nano Learning, a 10-minute time frame for presentation of a topic with one learning objective. The ACFE also will accept Nano Learning credits for CPE. Will others embrace this format? Many associations are looking to NASBA to evaluate the results before they move forward.

Implications for employers

The students of today are the employees of tomorrow. Organizations that know the characteristics of millennials and Generation Z will be better prepared to structure appropriate experiences for newly hired employees, which will help protect their investments.

Training new employees is expensive; they're organizations' principal investments. Training programs can incorporate the technologies that these generations have embraced. Clear expectations of acceptable behavior and frequent feedback on performance are relatively easy adjustments.

Collaborations between academics and practitioners to share information on new alternative teaching methods can benefit everyone. Why not be the first in your area to start an educational technology training day with your local ACFE chapter?

Tailor-made generational instruction

If you've been teaching for years, you might be tempted to use the same methods. Resist the temptation! Learning is a lifetime job.

Use the strengths of millennials and Generation Z to your advantage. They crave feedback and rewards. They are creative and technologically astute.

Remember these attributes when you customize your teaching, and you'll lead your students toward successful careers.

You can use the methods in this column (and many more) to give you greater assurance that your students will be ready to fight fraud effectively. And that's our main goal, isn't it?

Patricia A. Johnson, MBA, CFE, CPA, is the program coordinator of the Master's in Science in Forensic Accounting program at Canisius College in Buffalo, New York. She's chair of the ACFE Higher Education Advisory Committee. Her email address is: johnsonp@canisius.edu.